


How To Save A Solo

by a_myriad_of_stars



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: F/M, Mutiny, Mutual Pining, Oneshot, run away with me
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-13
Updated: 2018-04-13
Packaged: 2019-04-22 05:30:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,761
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14301828
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/a_myriad_of_stars/pseuds/a_myriad_of_stars
Summary: “Ben!” The sweet voice cried. “Ben, please get up! I need to get you on the Falcon! Please, you have to help me!”Ben. That’s me. But, only one person still calls me that.“Rey,” Kylo breathed. He’d get up for Rey. He’d stay awake for Rey. He’d pluck every diamond from every cluster of asteroids if it made Rey happy.“No need for all that, stupid, just get on the ship,” Rey chided.  Oh. He’d said that out loud.





	How To Save A Solo

 

Rey sat quietly in her quarters on the Millennium Falcon. It had been roughly six months since the events on The Supremacy and on Crait. Six months since she had closed the door on Kylo Ren. Six months since she dove head first into a dog fight, hoping to bring back Ben Solo, and failed.

Leia and the Rebels had found a new base to call home, and though they continued to plan out their next attacks, the need for battle plans had grown sparse in the past few months. They were left alone by the First Order, which had some people complacent, and other on edge. Rose and Finn had started...something after she had woken up, but Rey wasn’t sure of what kind. Poe had actually kissed Rey once after a mission, but she’d gently asked him to never do that again, right after she’d almost broken his nose.

While Rey wasn’t an official recruit for the Resistance, she still helped out with mechanical issues and repairs. What they couldn’t do on the spot, Rey would cobble together as a temporary fix until parts could be supplied. But while everyone else slept in the barracks at the base, Rey found her peace in the Falcon with Chewie and the Porgs that now resided in the wirings and air ducts.

At least, there was usually peace.

Rey began to feel a familiar pressure. A string being tightened from both ends. Without having to turn, she knew Kylo Ren was there. She resorted to ignoring him whenever he showed up.  
_Maybe he thinks I can’t see him anymore. Might make things easier_ , she thought. He tried his best to make her notice him, but she just kept at what she was doing, as if the fate of the universe depended on her cleaning her blaster right at that moment.

“Rey,” he croaked, pain shooting through his voice. It was his agony that made her finally turn, and what she saw made her heart stop.

In the six months since they last met, he’d grown some facial hair. A slight mustache grazed his upper lip, while his slightly asymmetrical chin was covered in a layer of scruff. But that wasn’t what nearly caused Rey to lose her lunch. He was sitting somewhere. His standard cloak and vest was gone, and what was left were tattered remains of his shirt and pants, boots completely forgotten. Thick, hot blood was oozing in between Kylo’s fingers from a wide abdominal wound that slashed across his naval. Cuts and bruises littered what visible skin there was, and from the state of his clothing, there were more yet to be seen.

“Oh, Ben! What happened to you,” Rey said, her shock leaking through the bond at the sight of his condition.

“Mutiny,” Kylo began. “Hux turned the First Order against me, and sent Storm Troopers to kill me. I got away, and I’m in my ship, but... I’m losing too much blood, I think. Everything’s fuzzy around the edges.”  
Rey’s panic flashed to anger, then subsided into a rushed sort of calm. “What star system are you in? I can have the Falcon in the air in a few minutes, but I need to know your location.”  
Kylo groaned in pain before responding. “I’m in Light-speed right now. I’m heading to Crait. I should be there in a few clicks.”

“Crait? Why are you going back there,” Rey asked.

A small, sad smile crinkled Kylo’s eyes. “Get to me before I die, and I’ll tell you. You know where to meet me.” Then the force let the string go slack, and Kylo Ren was gone.

A tear slid down Rey’s cheek, before she quickly wiped it away. _No time for crying now_. “Chewie! Prepare for take off! We’re going to Crait to pick up some cargo!”

********

The Falcon shrieked into Crait’s atmosphere, right above where the abandoned base was. Sensors picked up small lifeforms, probably the Vulpticies, but there was one blip that wasn’t quite constant, as if blinking in and out of life. It had to be Ben.  
Rey yanked on the yoke and guided the Falcon toward the blip, praying to Force that he would be alive when she got there.

  
********

Kylo was severely low on blood. He could feel his heart struggling to pump, but he urged it on with the Force. It was hard to breathe, and harder still to move, but he had hope that she would come. _She... who is She again?_ Kylo couldn’t remember. Everything was fuzzy. Everything hurt. He just wanted to sleep. _No!_ He shouted to himself. _She’ll come. She said she would. But... who is She?_

He couldn’t think on it for much longer, before his ship groaned and creaked around him. It was being lifted, and part of it was being crunched and broken off. The light from Crait’s sun blinded Kylo momentarily, before he was surrounded by the scent of desert roses mingled with engine fuel and salt. A shadow blocked out the sun, and a voice called someone’s name. No, not just someone’s name. His name. His old name.

“Ben!” The sweet voice cried. “Ben, please get up! I need to get you on the Falcon! Please, you have to help me!”  
_Ben. That’s me. But, only one person still calls me that._

“Rey,” Kylo breathed. He’d get up for Rey. He’d stay awake for Rey. He’d pluck every diamond from every cluster of asteroids if it made Rey happy.

“No need for all that, stupid, just get on the ship,” Rey chided. Oh. He’d said that out loud.

********

Rey half dragged, half force pushed Kylo out of the wreckage of his Tie Silencer, leading him up the ramp and into the bowels of his father’s ship. He was unconscious by the time they reached the med bay. Rey used to force to rip off the shredded remains of his clothing. She flipped on the Medical Droid that she’d borrowed (read: stolen) from the Rebels, and set it to work patching him up. While the droid did its job, Rey grabbed as many bacta patches as she could gather and applied them to the more superficial wounds on his face, torso, and legs, blushing wildly all the while.

When both Rey and the droid finished their work, she grabbed a thermal blanket off one of the shelves. While she draped the blanket over his unconscious form, she Force pulled a chair over to Ben’s bunk. As she sat down, she rested her elbows on the mattress, careful not to disturb him. She noticed, not for the first time, how absolutely massive Ben was. His feet stuck out slightly over the edge of the bunk and out from under the blanket. His torso was so wide that his arms didn’t fit on either side, so his left was pressed against the wall while the right was dangling off the bunk. Not wanting him to wake up with a cramp or his hands asleep, she gingerly took his wrists and led them to rest above his bandaged abdominal wound.

Rey sat in the med bay for Force knows how long, while Chewie flew the ship back toward the Resistance Base. She stared unabashedly at the rise and fall of Ben’s chest, making sure that he kept breathing. She’d also pick up one of his wrists from time to time and check his pulse, which was growing stronger, thanks to the fluids being pumped into his body from the Med Droid. She said nothing, but would sometimes feel a stray tear go down her cheek, and fall onto Ben’s exposed skin.

“I’ve never really had anyone to care about before,” she quietly confessed, knowing Ben couldn’t hear her. “Growing up on Jakku, I looked after myself, and put scratches on my wall to pass the days of waiting for someone, anyone, to come find me. Then BB-8 and Finn came crashing into my life, and everything all just happened at once. I met Han and Chewie, and Maz, then you took me and I was scared, but for some reason, I knew you wouldn’t hurt me. Then the whole rest of it just made me wonder why I got involved in the first place. But suddenly, I had a whole bunch of people to care about, and I had to make sure they were safe and... that includes you, Ben.”

She was sobbing now, gripping onto his right hand, gentle but firm. “That’s why I went to you. That’s why I fought for you, and beside you, and why it hurt so much when you asked me to join you. Because of course I wanted to come with you! I want us to be together and not have to worry about anyone else.” Rey paused to take a shuddering breath.

“But there’s other people that I care about now. And I’m not just going to let them get hurt, if there’s something I can do to stop it. I found the family I’ve been waiting for my whole life, and I want you to be part of it, Ben.” She rested her forehead on his sternum, careful to avoid his wounds, and traced the scar she had given him on Starkiller base. The simple motion, and the tactile sensation sent her slowly drifting until she was fast asleep, tears still running from her eyes.

********

Kylo woke slowly. He knew there was some kind of anesthesia in him from the sluggish sensation rippling through his aching body. He breathed slowly, deliberately, taking his time to fully come back to life. A strange weight on his chest alarmed him into full awareness. Ready to draw his lightsaber and fight, he shifted to get up, but stopped when he saw where the weight was coming from. No, not where. Who.

_Rey._

She was fast asleep on his chest, her right hand entwined with his, inches from her face, and her left was at the base of the scar she had given him. He noticed dried tear stains on her cheeks, and Kylo crinkled his eyebrows in confusion. _Did she cry for me?_ This wasn’t the first time he’d seen her cry, but this was the first time he wondered why.

Then he remembered why he was on a bunk in his father’s ship. The mutiny; hurdling through space to reach Crait; Rey coming to his rescue, a halo of light behind her, making her shine like the beacon of hope she was. She wasted no time, Kylo realized, crossing who knew how many star systems to find him. He was grateful... and surprised.

After the gaze she threw at him before shutting The Falcon’s door, and months of being ignored by the only person he wanted to notice him, he expected indifference, or disgust. But no, Kylo reasoned. She would be disappointed, for certain, or hurt, but after what they shared, she wouldn’t be disgusted by him.

He couldn’t resist lifting his right hand from hers and running a calloused thumb over the soft apple of her cheek. She’s so small, Kylo thought, affectionately, steadily swiping the remains of tears away.

Just as he was starting to drift back to sleep, Rey stirred, her hand grasping in the air for purchase, looking for something only she could see.  
  
“Cmm-buh” she muttered, her hand moving more frantically. Kylo looked around the room, and small objects started to lift off their shelves, centimeters at a time.

“Come back,” she whispered. She’s having a nightmare, he realized. Kylo moved his hand from her cheek to her shoulder, gently shaking her and calling her name in an attempt to wake her. Rey’s hands slid across Kylo’s chest wildly, still searching.

“Come back,” she cried. Kylo removed his hand from her shoulder, and took hold of her frantic fingers.

“Rey!” Her hands stopped, her eyes blew open, and the objects around the room clattered back into place. Her head shot up off Kylo’s chest to glance around the room, panic etched into her features. Her chest heaved in shaky breaths, until she slowly came down from her nightmare.

********

When she had finally calmed down, Rey turned to gaze at Kylo, concern blazing from his brandy-colored eyes. Seeing him alert sent relief ricocheting through her. He was alive. He was going to be okay. He was...holding her hand?...On top of his chest?...And not letting go?

Not that she minded him holding her hand, she’d gotten over that particular quirk of hers. It was the fact that her hand was pressed between his palm and his very bandaged but still very bare chest only covered by a blanket that caused her to nearly fall of her seat in a blushing pile.

“Oh, good. You’re awake. Umm... good so imjustgonnago.” Rey stood from her chair and slipped her hand out from Kylo’s grip, to make her way toward the door. “Um... take your time getting up, I guess? I’ll be in the cockpit if you need anything.”

Rey tried to leave the med bay, honest she did. But before she could leave the room, her feet slid off the floor, causing her to hover just above its surface, and was pulled like a magnet onto the chair she’d evacuated not moments earlier. Flashes of the throne room on The Supremacy ran through her mind, but instead of the threat Snoke promised from the gesture, Kylo performed it with an air of playfulness, allowing Ben Solo to seep through the chips of his armor. Rey grinned at the thought, before quickly shoving the corners of her mouth down into a placid line.

“I promised you,” Kylo began, “that I’d tell you why I went to Crait if you got to me before I died.” Rey fidgeted in her seat.

“We don’t have to do this, Ben,” Rey said. Kylo took her right hand in his, and raised himself into a seated position, effectively silencing her.  
“After what happened on The Supremacy, I wanted to destroy you. We fought side by side, and it was...beautiful. It felt like...everything had been leading up to us working together. It felt right. So when you went back to fighting against me, I was hurt, and angry. I wanted to hurt you like you hurt me.

“But when the battle was over, and the force connected us, I looked into your eyes, and I saw that you were hurting too, but you were hopeful. You still had hope that I would come with you, and when I didn’t, you closed the door.” Kylo took a shuddering breath, tears threatening to spill over, but he held it together.

“In that moment, I felt the way you’d felt in the mirror on the island. I felt the way I’ve felt for most of my life.”

“You felt alone,” Rey whispered. Kylo nodded, gripping her hand tighter, as if the very fabric of space depended on keeping their hands entwined. Maybe it did.

“I went to Crait because it was the last place you looked at me, and saw someone worth saving,” Kylo finally confessed. “You looked at me, and you didn’t see the monster I’d become. You saw who I used to be. You saw Ben Solo.” Sorrow and guilt flowed in the Force between Kylo and Rey, each wanting to console the other as shared tears tracked down their faces and landed on their joined hands.

Kylo continued. “I thought I was going to die when I fled in my ship. So I decided that if I was going to die, I wanted to die where you saw Ben Solo instead of Kylo Ren. I figured you deserved at least that.”

Rey didn’t realize what she was doing until she felt the softness of her lips pressed against Kylo’s. Chaste and soft, she pulled away quickly, startled by her own actions. She didn’t dare move, or scarcely breath, but she relaxed when Kylo brought up his left hand to rest against her right cheek. His calloused thumb grazed under her eye, and his fingertips curled behind her ear and against her neck, guiding Rey slowly closer toward him, until their lips met.  
  
Slow, and gently, Rey moved from her chair to sit on the edge of the bunk, her left hand moving of its own volition to rest against Kylo’s scarred cheek. She wanted to be closer to him, but feared opening his wounds, so she kept still, allowing him to take the lead in whatever this new experience was.


End file.
